Are school trips packages?

In 2014 Andy Cooper wrote an article for the TLQ on whether school trips amounted to package holidays. Judging by a recent press release the CAA has taken this advice on board!

“Teachers and parents are being advised to check that any school trips involving air travel, booked for the coming academic year, are fully protected by the ATOL scheme. The UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), which runs ATOL, is making the call as schools start organising class trips for the coming months.

The new advice aims to prevent parents being left substantially out of pocket if the tour operator organising their children’s trip collapses. Parents of children at one school were left with bills of £750 per head earlier this year after the school’s chosen tour operator collapsed. The company concerned did not have ATOL protection.

The CAA has set up a dedicated ATOL webpage for the education sector, which gives targeted advice for anyone responsible for booking a school trip. ATOL does not protect holidays where surface travel is used to reach a destination, for example.

The CAA pointed out that many school trips, such as skiing holidays, can be quite complex, involving several different providers of flights, accommodation and activities. If a tour operator organising the overall trip is ATOL protected then all individual components of the holiday are fully covered.”